SCUM • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Scum

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/skəm/ Listen

noun

Scum n.

The extraneous matter or impurities which rise to the surface of liquids in boiling or fermentation, or which form on the surface by other means; also, the scoria of metals in a molten state; dross. "Some to remove the scum as it did rise."

Refuse; recrement; anything vile or worthless. "The great and innocent are insulted by the scum and refuse of the people."

verb

Scum v. t. (past & past part. scummed; pres. part. scumming)

To take the scum from; to clear off the impure matter from the surface of; to skim. "You that scum the molten lead."

To sweep or range over the surface of. (Obs.) "Wandering up and down without certain seat, they lived by scumming those seas and shores as pirates."

Scum v. i. To form a scum; to become covered with scum. Also used figuratively. "Life, and the interest of life, have stagnated and scummed over."

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Etymology of 'Scum'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Scum" Quotes from Famous Books

... with a wet towel round his head, writing a leader upon the event. This production, which was very sonorous and effective, was peppered all over with such phrases as "protection of property," "outraged majesty of the law," and "scum of civilization"— expressions which had been used so continuously by Mr. O'Flaherty, that he had come to think that he had a copyright in them, and loudly accused the London papers of plagiarism if he happened to ...

— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... Filthy slimy Substance: Then put it into a Morter, beat it well; take it out and wash it at some running stream, till the Foulness is gone: Then put it in a close Earthen pot; let it stand Four or Five days, look to its Purging, and scum it: When clean, put it into another Earthen Pot, and keep it close ...

— The School of Recreation (1696 edition) • Robert Howlett

... at what appeared a large green pond full of vegetation and in places covered with a thick scum. But it had a current and an outlet, proving it to be a huge, spring. Roy pointed down ...

— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey

... coat, the yellow stockings—this man dragged wearily the wheelbarrow in the grim silences under the sinister skies of Dartmoor, with warders to taunt, or insult, or browbeat the Irish felon-patriot—with the very dregs and scum of our lowest social depths for companions and colleagues—and then think of this same man standing up before the supreme and august assembly where the might, sovereignty, power, and omnipotence of this world-wide empire are centred, and holding it for more than an hour and a half ...

— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor

... ashes fell over the sea so thickly that within three miles of the island you could walk on them, and even five hundred miles away, the ashes formed a scum on the surface of the sea. The finer dust and the icy particles from the condensed vapor reached extreme heights in the air. These dust particles spread all round the world, completing the circuit ...

— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler

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